Ashen Stars

They call you lasers. Sometimes you’re called scrubbers, regulators, or shinestars. To the lawless denizens of the Bleed, whether they be pirates, gangsters or tyrants, you’re known in less flattering terms. According to official Combine terminology, the members of your hard-bitten starship crew are known as Licensed Autonomous Zone Effectuators. You’re the seasoned freelancers local leaders call when a situation proves too tough, too baffling, or simply too weird to handle on their own. In the abandoned fringe of inhabited planets known as the Bleed, you’re as close to a higher authority as they come.

In this gritty space opera game, the PCs are Lasers, freelance troubleshooters and law enforcers operating in a remote sector called the Bleed. They’re needed in the wake of a massive retreat by the Combine, the utopian empire that colonized it. Amid the ashes of a devastating war, the lasers solve mysteries, fix thorny problems, and explore strange corners of space—all on a contract basis. They balance the immediate rewards of a quick buck against their need to maintain their reputation, so that they can continue to quickly secure lucrative contracts and pay the upkeep on their ship and their cyber- and viroware enhancements. Featuring seven new and highly detailed playable species -

The eerily beautiful, nature-loving, emotion-fearing balla

The cybes, former humans radically altered by cybernetic and genetic science

The durugh, hunched, furtive ex-enemies of the Combine who can momentarily phase through solid matter.

The humans, adaptable, resourceful, and numerous. They comprise the majority of a typical laser crew.

The kch-thk, warrior locust people who migrate to new bodies when their old ones are destroyed.

Ashen Stars also contains extensive, streamlined rules for space combat, 14 different types of ship, a rogues gallery of NPC threats and hostile species' and a short adventure to get you started in the Bleed. Read feedback from pre-orderers and see sample chapters here.

Playtesters and Preorderers say:

“Nailed it – Just nailed it. I read through this book like it was a good novel. I’ve never called an RPG rulebook a page turner, but here it is! Great setting, engaging to read, and a smooth and polished system. Robin Laws continues to impress, and after seeing the final layout PDF, I have to say that Pelgrane has outdone themselves with this game. I cannot wait to have the physical thing in my hands (and the hands of my players!)”

“I’m going to big up the Pelgrane Posse."

"I have my PDF and I cannot say just how impressed I am with both the content, style and layout. Yet another beautifully written evolution of Gumshoe with a unique take on the genre, written by one of the best authors in the industry."

"On looks alone it puts products from other bigger companies to shame. I have a sense that I really have got my monies worth (and I haven’t got the hardcopy yet) For a small publisher Pelgrane can flex some serious creative muscle."

"The bar hasn’t just been raised, it’s in a geo-stationary orbit”

“And congratulations on this game – I think it is destined to become a classic – This is the best sci-fi RPG I’ve ever read.”

TL;DR This has been my first entry into the GUMSHOE system. My opinion of this particular product is split: I really like the system and the overall premise for the setting, but the text contains numerous errors and I think that one of the races in the [...]

The first thing I'm going to say about this game is that it's GUMSHOE. I really, really like GUMSHOE. It's a wonderful system that really supports the style of games I like to run and play. So, as soon as I saw there was a new GUMSHOE game out, and that [...]

This is another amazing success from Pelgrane Press. The GUMSHOE engine provides the basis for the game, but it's so different from the previous games like Fear Itself or Trail of Cthulhu. The game is set in a universe where a powerful alien race was [...]

Ashen Stars is a game that takes its genre, "gritty space opera," very very VERY seriously. So much that sometimes it becomes annoying, as when things happen or are the way they are because that is what would have happnened on Star Trek: TNG or the new [...]

Ashen Stars is a very well made game. It's very much a harkening back to older science-fiction from back before it was quite so serious (i.e. when there were aliens) with a modern touch. Ashen Stars is one of the better science-fiction games out there, [...]

These products were created by scanning an original printed edition. Most older books are in scanned image format because original digital layout files never existed or were no longer available from the publisher.

For PDF download editions, each page has been run through Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software to attempt to decipher the printed text. The result of this OCR process is placed invisibly behind the picture of each scanned page, to allow for text searching. However, any text in a given book set on a graphical background or in handwritten fonts would most likely not be picked up by the OCR software, and is therefore not searchable. Also, a few larger books may be resampled to fit into the system, and may not have this searchable text background.

For printed books, we have performed high-resolution scans of an original hardcopy of the book. We essentially digitally re-master the book. Unfortunately, the resulting quality of these books is not as high. It's the problem of making a copy of a copy. The text is fine for reading, but illustration work starts to run dark, pixellating and/or losing shades of grey. Moiré patterns may develop in photos. We mark clearly which print titles come from scanned image books so that you can make an informed purchase decision about the quality of what you will receive.

Original electronic format

These ebooks were created from the original electronic layout files, and therefore are fully text searchable. Also, their file size tends to be smaller than scanned image books. Most newer books are in the original electronic format. Both download and print editions of such books should be high quality.